Michigan Tech forward Rylan Gould looks for a teammate during a game against Minnesota Friday, Oct. 3, at 3M Arena at Mariucci in Minneapolis, Minnesota. (Photo courtesy of Michigan Tech University)

HOUGHTON — After opening the season with an eye-popping split against the then-No. 8 Minnesota Golden Gophers, the Michigan Tech Huskies hockey team enjoyed a week off before facing the Alaska Nanooks on the road. The Huskies did what they needed to do to win on Friday, taking the game, 3-1. However, Saturday was a very different game, with the Nanooks earning a 5-1 win.

First-year head coach Bill Muckalt liked a lot of what he saw in Friday’s win, but was less impressed with Saturday’s matchup.

“In summary, bye week, long travel, 20 hours up, 20 hours back; liked our game Friday, probably one play away from having a bagel, goose egg, and a complete team effort on the road,” he said. “So, really happy about that. Had a real positive video session, team meeting, Saturday. We as a staff felt really good.

“For some reason, we were a little flat. Our physicality and some of our sequencing, connective issues on breakouts, routing, and defensive zone coverage, it really compounded. Give credit to Alaska. Their goalie made some huge saves on Saturday. The best scoring chances of the game never went in for us. Then we got into penalty trouble, and I think that took a lot of energy out of us. We kind of derailed in that third period.”

Muckalt and his staff have 13 freshmen and five transfers on the Huskies’ roster, so that is a lot of new faces to corral into one game plan. Some of that showed Saturday when the Huskies struggled to pick themselves back up.

“In a bigger picture, I think it’s the thrill of victory and the agony of defeat,” Muckalt said. “We’re feeling really good about ourselves after Friday’s win going into Saturday, and the other teams getting talking to, and they came out with that push. Like I said, we just got into penalty trouble.

“We didn’t execute on our chances, and we just didn’t have that juice in that third period to really, once the score was 3-1, then they have a penalty shot. Kid makes a really good move, it’s 4-1. (We) take another penalty, and it’s 5-1; really great, great shot. Probably execution-wise, that’s something our PK (penalty kill) would want over.”

The Huskies, after starting junior Owen Bartoszkiewicz in the first three games of the season in goal, turned to senior Max Vayrynen Saturday, for his first start since last November. While the numbers look bad, Muckalt likes what he sees in Vayrynen’s game.

“We have a lot of confidence in Max,” said Muckalt. “He hasn’t played a game in about a year. That’s tough for a goalie. It would have been nice to have an exhibition game or something to do that. I think you want the first one over again, but outside of that, I think, we have to be better in front of him.

“But, let’s be real, the defensive breakdowns could have been prevented. Breakdowns are going to happen, and you’re going to have turnovers, but we have to be more predictable, and be more connected in front of our house, and our defensive zone coverage. We can’t leave guys alone in the scoring square with free hands, or second chance opportunities. We saw that a couple times on Saturday night.”

What Muckalt is looking for is consistency.

“There’s no question we’re young,” he said. “We have 13 freshmen. I think that might be the most in the country. (We) have 18 new players. But, when you get on the ice, I’m not interested in that. It’s building, growing, learning, getting better.

“The second thing to probably point out, that’s our third and fourth games of the year. We’re playing against a team where that was their seventh and eighth games of the season. So to ramp that up, the travel, everything, it is what it is. There’s no excuses. We didn’t get the job done Saturday night. This is a results business. So how do we get better? How do we grow? How do we learn from it? Physicality’s got to get better, and then some teaching points that we’re going to have to clean up. But it’s consistency. We have to continue to find a way to play complete games, and understand that every night we’ve got to bring that urgency, and that standard. We talk a lot about standards, expectations, that consistency, and that’s where we’ve got to get to, to take our game to another level.”

Scouting the Bulldogs

The Ferris State Bulldogs come to the MacInnes Student Ice Arena this weekend 1-3 overall after splitting two weeks ago with then-No. 1 Western Michigan, beating them on Friday night, 3-2, before falling Saturday 6-4.

Last weekend, the BUlldogs defeated Simon Fraser and the USNTDP U18 team in a pair of exhibitions.

The Bulldogs are in a new era under first-year head coach Brett Riley, who coached at Long Island University before moving to Big Rapids.

They are led offensively by senior forward Josh Zary, who has three goals and four points in four games. Senior forward Gavin Best also has three goals.

Like the Huskies, the Bulldogs have a number of transfer players this season. Included among them is junior forward Tanner Rowe from Calumet. Rowe has played in all four games so far, recording one assist.

In goal, the Bulldogs are splitting juniors Hobie Hedquist and Noah Rupprecht. Hedquist is 1-1 overall, with a 2.03 goals against average and a .947 save percentage. Rupprecht is 0-2 with a 6.65 goals against average and a .841 save percentage.

Game times

The Huskies and Bulldogs will do battle Friday night at 7:07 p.m. at the MacInnes Student Ice Arena. Saturday, the two teams will faceoff again, this time at 6:07 p.m.